Customer Reviews

NEW Family Stone (DVD)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Thie review it for Fox Video 2006 Widescreen DVD release of The Family Stone.

Quailty of the dvd is flawless as you'd expect.

The underlying themes of the movie surpass the obvious and typical christmas themes. The sub plots and nuances in the movie make it enjoyable, honest, and funny. They make it about a real family with realy problems. Real issues. They layer the movie with moments of laughter along with the inherent sadness of the plot.

You know and see that it's a family that's been through a lot. That love each other and want to try to protect each other. When Dermot Mulroney brings Sarah Jessica Parker to his family, chaos errupts.

A great film for the holidays. And a great film even when it isn't christmas. It's worth the watch.

Le DVD est arrivé très rapidement et en très bon état; je suis très satisfait de mon achat, je recommande le site Amazon !

The Family Stone is a funny, engaging, feel-good chick flick for the Holidays. You know what to expect but it still exudes warmth and a sense of fun. I just love the family!

Great actors and great storyline. I really like this movie, especially at Christmas time, it puts you in the right mood for it. SJP is so uptight in this though and she loses it a bit too fast as soon as she has a drink... how about talking things out first before getting too drunk with your future in law... and also kind of odd that there is no weirdness at the next Christmas when they get together and they have changed mates... but despite all this, I recommend this movie - thumbs up!

I watched "The Family Stone" with some trepidation because while I knew it had this great ensemble cast the trailer made it clear that this holiday film was going to go to engage in one of my least favorite romantic plots. That would be where Person A is engaged to Person B and brings them home to meet the family, a which point Person B will fall for Person C, who is the sibling of Person A. In this Person A would be Everett Stone (Dermot Mulroney), Person B would be his fiance, Meredith Morton (Sarah Jessica Parker), and Person B would be Everett's brother, Ben (Luke Wilson). I just think of my brother and I being the siblings in such a story and all I can think is that it would be the end of the world as we know it. A story like "Moonstruck" pushes me about as far as I can go along these lines. Fortunately, "The Family Stone," is about more than this plot line.

One of those things is also clear from the trailer. When Everett brings Meredith home to meet the family, the Stones do not like her. True, Meredith is wound way too tight, but Everett's sister Amy (Rachel McAdams) poisons the well before the couple arrives because Meredith clears her throat when she is nervous. The matriarch of the family, Sybil (Diane Keaton) is horrified by the thought that Everett will ask for her mother's wedding ring to give to Meredith. Even the family's black sheep, Ben, who seems to be the only one who does not have a problem with Meredith, blithely announces the two do not love each other. It is Kelly (Craig T. Nelson), the father, who points out Meredith does not trust herself. However, this conclusion does not persuade anybody to treat her any differently. So I was worried that the arc of the film predicted by the trailer would play itself out.

Fortunately, there is something the trailer does not give away that adds pathos to the proceedings. The insults and the slapstick do not end up being the most memorable part of "The Family Stone," at least not for me (which is fine, because I hate it when trailers have all of the best gags of a movie, something that is happening way too frequently this century). Writer-director Thomas Bezucha, whose only previous credit is "Early May," really lets Meredith dig her own grave quite a bit here, but he also gives her a moment of redemption when she does one thing right. More importantly, when we get to the end of the movie, Bezucha does not make us cry. He lets us cry.

As mentioned previously, the ensemble cast is pretty impressive. The rest of the Stone family consists of another daughter, Susannah Stone Trousdale (Elizabeth Reaser), who is expecting her second child, another son, Thad (Tyrone Giordano), and Thad's partner, Patrick Thomas (Brian White). Thad is gay, but more importantly he is deaf, and one of the defining characteristic of the family is that they tend to sign as they speak, even if Thad is not around. All Meredith has on her side is her sister, Julie (Claire Danes), called in when fleeing the Stone house for a local inn proves insufficient. There are some funny slapstick moments in this one, but the idea this 2005 film was a screwball comedy is ludicrous. This one has a lot more heart than that.